Phanous Research and Innovation Centre is established in 2019 and the time scope of this R&D strategy plan is the five year period following an operational status of the centre. Within the scope of this document, short term refers to a period of two to three years, and long term refers to a period of around five years from establishment.
A R&D strategy plan may serve a whole host of purposes. However within the time scope this document, we have identified the following usages as of special significance. In all items we follow a simple pattern of asking three important questions:
We must ensure that the general operation and development of Phanous Research and Innovation Centre remains aligned with the requirements and strategies of the holding.
Misalignment will lead to lost opportunity to create value or to cost.
As a research institute, Phanous Research and Innovation Centre does not have most of the operational limitations and considerations of the parent company in terms of joint external collaborations. At the same time, since Phanous Research and Innovation Centre is an independent unit, it may act as a proxy to establish effective links with organizations we are currently having difficulty linking up with. (for example other universities or research centres national and international)
Lack of collaborations will seriously jeopardize several primary objectives of setting up Phanous Research and Innovation Centre.
This is related to all decision making processes related to the request of resources such as equipment, funding credit, people etc.
Poorly planned (where poorness relates to timing, amount, nature etc.) resource requests will reduce sustainability of funding, create a confidence crisis and disrupt objectiveness by creating conflict of interest.
The R&D strategy plan should provide pointers on how:
Phanous Research and Innovation Centre will assume a corporate identify which will evolve overtime. This identify is considered as an asset for Hezardastan holding.
A poor corporate brand will substantially slow down growth.
This refers to the certification from the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology to operate as a government approved research centre.
No certification will impose some operational limitations such as not being to formally employ faculty members.
The R&D strategy plan should illustrate under what conditions should we consider activating the certification process.
To determine what form of institute does best serve our purpose.
As a business we don’t yet have the core competencies to handle large scale and extended research and innovation projects.
As we move closer to the technology edge, this shortcoming will negatively affect our expansion.
The R&D strategy plan should indicate how:
Hezardastan holding is agile, dynamic and with a high staff turn over. Each decision and its effect will likely spread over a large number of acting agents. Under such circumstances it is important that decisions taken over a time span, are objective, consistent and coherent.
Low consistency will lead to loss of motivation and conflict.
Is the Phanous Research and Innovation Centre R&D strategy plan written in such a way to facilitate and promote consistenc of decisions overtime?
Is the Phanous Research and Innovation Centre R&D strategy plan written to facilitate and promote coherency of decisions across the scopes?
We believe that one of the leading contributing factors to the success of Hezardsatan holding has been its culture (as encapsulated by its core values). We want to get inspiration from, and build upon these values and culture to create a similarly positive environment.
A culture mismatch will lead to misalignment, slow down knowledge transfer and make staff rotation difficult. In addition, a not fit for purpose culture will reduce motivation and affect creativity.
It should holistically determine what are the main features of culture we want to establish at Phanous Research and Innovation Centre.
It should serve as a reference to determine if our decisions, processes and procedures lead to a culture like the one we intend to have.
Short term funding is initially secured upfront. Long term funding or its sources (internal or external) are not at the moment secured.
No funds will mean the end of operations.
The R&D strategy plan should aid people to remain focus on the value creation cycle and demonstrate the real value of the work.
The R&D strategy plan should be useful in determining key policies such as do we need financial independence? How can we get it if so?
In our view gatekeeping is a fundamental tool in ensuring that the value creation cycle operates as intended and business impact is made.
Gatekeeping needs to be repeatable, consistent and objective. Poor gatekeeping will disrupt the value creation cycle.
Distinguished people we want to work for us as lead researchers and PIs will want to know operational details about Phanous Research and Innovation Centre before they make a commitment.
Distinguished people will not risk their academic reputation/career by getting involved with half backed ideas.
In line with our vision and mission, we want to gather a pool of highly distinguished talent at Phanous Research and Innovation Centre. We must therefore create a strong HR brand such that these people will want to choose us to work with. HR Branding is more related to software (i.e. processes) rather that hardware (i.e. architecture).
Poor HR branding will reduce our success chances and drive up costs.
One of the primary reasons people loose motivation over time is that they loose sight of the meaning and significance of their work. When these are documented future employees may refer to them, give comments and therefore develop a sense of ownership and engagement.
Loss of motivation will directly impact depth and breadth of research work and hit employee engagement.
We face several internal and external operational risks which have the potential to significantly divert Phanous Research and Innovation Centre from its development plan. We should have risk mitigation plans.
Since risks can cover almost all aspects of the operation of Phanous Research and Innovation Centre, poor risk mitigation planning will have widespread adverse effects.
Table 1 lists all the outcomes we expect to achieve from our R&D strategy plan. The scope of issues covered in Table 1 is clearly wide. It is likely that an effort made towards fulfillment of all identified issues shall meet with failure due to the resulting lack of focus and functionality.
Our priority for the moment is to concentrate on issues of significant implications. In Table 1, the priorities for the scope of the R&D strategy plan are thus indicated.
| Issue | Time frame | Expected business Impact | Priority |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alignment | Long term | Significant | ✔ |
| Collaboration | Long term | Ordinary | |
| Resource allocation | Short term | Significant | ✔ |
| Branding | Short term | Significant | ✔ |
| Certification | Long term | Ordinary | |
| Development of core competency | Long term | Ordinary | |
| Coherency | Long term | Significant | ✔ |
| Culture | Short term | Significant | ✔ |
| Funding | Long term | Significant | ✔ |
| Gatekeeping | Short term | Significant | ✔ |
| Recruitment | Short term | Ordinary | |
| HR branding | Short term | Ordinary | |
| Motivation | Short term | Significant | ✔ |
| Risk mitigation | Short term | Ordinary |
Table1 : policy making implications of the Phanous Research and Innovation Centre R&D strategy plan
By time frame in Table 1 we are referring to our projected estimate of how far it takes the respective issue to mature into an observable impact on the operations and processes of Phanous Research and Innovation Centre. Short and long term have already been defined.
By expected business Impact in Table 1 we are referring to our projected estimate of the size of the impact, within the expected time frame.